Deep fried oatmeal prawns

My MIL is good in cooking, the most delicious dish i ate during the stay in KK was deep fried oatmeal prawns. I loved the dish so much, so did Jo. He could finish the whole plate of rice if there's a plate of deep fried oatmeal prawns, and he calls the dish as "bomb meat".
Yesterday, i cooked the "bomb meat" for lunch, but sigh, its taste and its appearance didn't come out as the one which cooked by my MIL. I didn't know why, the oatmeal just couldn't stick on the prawns, i guessed maybe i didn't put the egg white, actually i would put if i could find an egg at that time.
The prawns were not cheap, it charged me RMB50 for about 15 prawns. If in KK, it's just about RM25 for a KILO, the prawn even looks much bigger than the prawn here!

Breakfast for boys

Eli loves the "siew-mai".

Ever since my Jo started his school here, i found that he tends to be like very typical China boy who loves to eat "man-tou" (馒头) and porridge during the breakfast. Since now it is Winter holidays, so i have to prepare 3 meals for him, luckily, i still could find the frozen "man-tou" easily from supermarket, just steam them for about 5 mins then they're ready to be served. Jo loves the onion "man-tou" more than the red bean paste, so does Eli too. As for me, i dislike "man-tou", so i have to steam myself a plate of "siew-mai" (烧卖), my Eli who is a food lover sure will come to me and share my portion.

Be frankly, it's so tired to take care 2 boys at the same time and my day simply occupies by them. Sigh, i hardly have my own time to read, to blog and even have no time to go to toilet! Just can't imagine how's my life going to be after giving birth to No.3.

More fishes more protein

Fried Ma-Gao fish (马鲛鱼)

Steam fish (not sure about the fish name)

We're very into eating fish lately, more fishes more protein, that's definitely good for a pregnant woman. Actually i am sort of lady who doesn't like fish, but due to pregnant, it's wise to take more fishes, good for mother and good for the growing baby. Hubby, opposite of me who prefers fish more than other poultry. As for Jo, he only likes to have steam fish and likes his rice mixed with the gravy. With the gravy, i can save my time for not boiling soup. As for the fried Ma-Gao fish, i normally would squeeze lemon juice on top of the fish rather than using soy sauce. The fish tastes delicious with lemon juice and lemon is good to be used for removing the fishy and the heat from frying.

Home Cooked Dinner @ 15 December 08

Stir-fried leek flowers with fish paste.

Braised chicken in potato.

Sai-Yong-Choi (西洋菜) soup, boiled together with Candied date (蜜枣) and Fructus Momordicae aka LuoHanGuo (罗汉果).

Those are the dishes i cooked on Monday night, i love to eat leek flower, which the vege that i had never taken when i was staying in Malaysia. And only knew this yummicious vege after i had moved to China. If you never try this before, do try it, bet you''ll like it.

I coughed badly on Monday, went to see Chinese doctor but he said he dares not to give me any herbal medicine due to i am pregnant. So without any proper medicine, the only way to cure my cough is let the cough goes away itself. And luckily i could remember my ex-nanny ever told me that LuoHanGuo is good for soothing cough and it helps to remove heat and moisten lungs. So this Sai-Yong-Choi soup really came timely to sooth my dry cough. Other than drinking this soup, i have also been boiling myself a cup of LuoHanGuo water, one cup daily, and today, i am almost recovered from my bad cough. Imagine, i had been coughing almost every minute on Monday before i got myself a bowl of Sai-Yong-Choi soup, just within 3 days, i almost can wave goodbye to my cough. I also take "Pi-Pa-Gao" (京都念慈菴川貝枇杷膏) too, pour 2 full spoonfuls to the hot water and sip it, i have always loved to sip like this as it helps soothing my throat too.

Home Cooked Dinner @ 03 December 08

咸菜豆腐番茄烧骨汤
Super tasty hum-choy (salty vege), Taufu, tomato and barbecue pork rib soup.

潮式焖豆腐，配料西芹，杂豆，咸菜，瘦肉
Stew TauFu in Teow Chew styled, ingredients : celery, mix veges, salty vege, fine chop pork mince.

紫菜鲜鱿煎蛋

Seaweed and squid scrabble egg

That's the 2 dishes + soup i had prepared for my family yesterday. Simple yet wholesome. I was initially wanted to vomit after i cooked the dish 2, which is the "Stew TauFu in Teow Chew styled", i didn't know why, simply like couldn't stand the smell although it did smell fragrant. Funny that the dish just perfect for my stomach, so did the seaweed and squid scrabble egg. As for Jo, he loves the scrabble egg so much, for him, it looks like a home-made pizza. And he likes the soup too, normally he needed to be threatened for finishing his soup, but yesterday, he even asked for another bowl of soup after finished his first bowl. So i guess i should cook these dishes more often, at least less screaming at Jo when comes to dinner time.

Ayam Kurma

Cooking along with taking care of the kids, is my current interest. I was actually not very keen to cook at the first 3 years of my motherhood, reason was because i hate to clean up the kitchen after every cook. I was definitely a clean freak then. But day after day and year after year, i was surprised to see myself has developed such a great interest in cooking. Just like what i had mentioned in my previous post, i'm very into cooking lately, and have been scratching my head and browsing internet for more healthy recipes. Last time i was a clean freak, and now i am health freak. Well, not really health freak perhaps, since i had eaten quite a lot of unhealthy foods lately.

I have been craving for spicy foods a lot lately. Since i still have few packs of instant Ayam Kurma sauce that i brought back from Sabah, so i just cooked it on Monday night. One dish was enough for that night although i'm used to cook 2 dishes + 1 soup for dinner.

Ayam Kurma

Having been told that different craving would determine the gender of baby, emm...i'm a spicy lover now, then what is my baby's gender?

Asam Laksa Maggie Mee

I know i should eat something nutritional at this moment, but i just couldn't eat well other than taking this : -

Hehe...my Asam Laksa Maggie Mee :)

It was actually my breakfast yesterday, although there was bread and biscuit available, i still preferred to eat something spicy and sour, so off i cooked myself a bowl of Maggie Mee with lot of other ingredients. I must be too hungry then, and i gobbled it down in less than 5 minutes.

Sweet and sour meat balls

I am very into cooking lately, after being survived from the maid foods for the past 3 months. Since Jo prefers home cooked food more than dining outside, so indirectly i was like getting a lot of virtual supports from him hence to cook more nutritional foods for him. So does hubby, who always prefers to eat at home, well, for money sake. :)

I had great craving for meat balls for the couple of weeks ago, although i could get those instant meat balls from supermarket, i still preferred to DIY the meat balls. My simple recipe :-
1. buy fresh pork and chop pork into mince (i prefer to chop manually rather than using the meat processor)
2. marinate the mince with oyster sauce, sesame oil, corn starch and parsley too.
3. add some bread/biscuit crumbs to the mince
4. then heat the wok with some olive oil (any of your preference oil)
5. take a small handful of the mixture and make it into ball-shaped
6. place the ball-shaped into the wok
7. slightly fry and turn it for both side
8. pick up and place on the plate

This is how the meat balls look like :-

Then, another round of sauce preparation, the steps as following :
1. dice onion
2. slice tomato into pieces
3. fine chop the green and red bell pepper
4. fine chop the button mushroom
5. heat the wok again with olive oil
6. fry the above ingredients

Next, pour in 1 cup of water with mixture of tomato sauce and sugar (for neutralizing the sour taste), it will look like this :-
And, this is the fined cook sweet and sour meat balls. My Jo, even my hubby loves this dish so much, they even asked for more share after finished their given portion.

Birthday Macaroni

Simple Macaroni with mixed veges and sliced bacon, served well with pasta sauce. But if you do not have pasta sauce, then have fined cook sauce from full cream milk, unsalted butter and cheese will give you the same taste as instant pasta sauce too.

This supposed a birthday breakfast for my hubby on his big day. But that day i was too tired and couldn't get my body up from the bed, so i only made this Macaroni yesterday. A day after his birthday. However, i know he won't bother it as long as i have prepared him something to eat. Actually, he can always has his breakfast at his office canteen since all the food served is FOC, but he still prefers to eat my home-cooked food as those canteen foods are too oily and salty to be eaten.

My self-created recipe of steamed pork mince

This was our yesterday dinner dish ~ steamed pork mince ~. I put quite a lot of ingredients such as water chestnut, black mushroom, sweet corn, green peas and parsley, so the taste was actually quite wonderful. Even my little baby enjoyed eating this steamed dish, although just a little portion, it still brought delightful to me, it simply meant that my baby is on his way of recovering.

Online Recipes Portal

Thinking to buy a set of cookbooks just now while i was wandering around the book store, ended up i put them back to shelf as i really didn't have heart to spend again. This month income has dropped and i had been overly spending last 2 weeks, so, it's really not so wise to spend again. Though i just love those cookbooks so much...

Actually, i don't like to cook as i just hate to clean the greasy after cooking, but what to do, as a wife and a mother, i have to cook for my family. Since cooking is not my hobby, that's why i have always been running out of ideas. And, due to this reason, i need more Recipes in order to diversify my dishes. Like what old people said, the better you cook, the frequent your hubby stay at home. Honestly, i really don't care whether he spends his time in front of the telly or spends his time to play Xbox, i would feel extremely contented as long as he is at home.

Well, don't just talk about my hubby as my kids are my throne too, so i definitely need Cake Recipes to bake more cakes for my boys. Baking cake for them is not only feed their hunger, as the cake inside has been embraced my love towards them too. Recipes are important for ladies, somehow i felt like it is as important as having diamond in your ring finger. :)

Ok, let's search to MyDish, see whether i can find the recipe for making Mango Layer Cake or not? Below is the one i currently crazily craving for :

Chicken & Roasted Garlic Risotto

I have subscribed to Campbell in order to receive their free recipe, this is what i have received yesterday "Chicken & Roasted Garlic Risotto". Share with all the readers here..

Ingredients:

• 4 boneless chicken breast halves
• 1 tbsp. butter OR margarine
• 1 can (10 3/4 oz.) Campbell's® Condensed Cream of Chicken Soup OR 98% Fat Free Cream of Chicken Soup
• 1 can (10 3/4 oz.) Campbell's® Condensed Cream of Mushroom with Roasted Garlic Soup
• 2 cups water
• 2 cups uncooked instant white rice
• 1 cup frozen peas and carrots

Directions:

• SEASON chicken as desired.
• HEAT butter in skillet over medium-high heat.
• Cook chicken 10 min or until browned.
• Set chicken aside.
• ADD soups and water. Heat to a boil. Stir in rice and peas and carrots. Return chicken to skillet.
• Cover and cook over low heat 5 min or until done.
• Remove from heat. Let stand 5 min.

Keen to try it out? Yeah....i am keen...

No stove cooking

"Fu-yu" spare ribs rice

Ingredients -
Spare ribs, "fu-yu", "taufu-bok" and white cabbage.

Marinade ingredients -
Soy sauce (can substitute oyster sauce), dark soy sauce, sugar, oil and corn starch.

Method -
1. Marinade over the spare ribs and *marinade ingredients for 10 mins or more.
2. Slice the white cabbage thinly or finely chop it.
3. Mix the "fu-yu" to the "taufu-bok".
4. Cook the rice.
5. Put the *2 and *3 into the rice cooker then follow by the *1 when the rice is 90% cooked.
6. Put back the cooker lid.
7. It's ready once the button is up. Or cover it for another 10 mins to ensure it's completely cooked.